“Before India became an agrarian country, there are examples where all communities including Brahmins have slaughtered cows for consumption,” the BJP leader said.

Karnataka BJP spokesperson Vaman Acharya has sparked a row with his comments that Brahmins too slaughtered cows for consumption before India became an agrarian country, but retracted his remarks after facing flak from his own partymen.

“Before India became an agrarian country, there are examples where all communities including Brahmins have slaughtered cows for consumption,” he said on a Kannada news channel during a panel discussion on the Centre’s notification banning sale and purchase of cattle at animal markets for slaughter.

Several state party leaders like C T Ravi and Go Madhusudhan condemned Acharya’s remarks, which apparently referred to the Vedic period.

Distancing the party from Acharya’s comments, senior BJP MLA and spokesperson Suresh Kumar said in a Facebook post that the remarks were “completely against the party’s beliefs and ideology.”

As he came under attack from within the BJP and in the social media, Acharya told PTI, “I have retracted from my statement, as I want to close the issue. I don’t want to hurt my party.”

Speaking on the TV channel, Acharya pointed out that various tribes in the North-East even today eat cow.

“Gau Maate...as a scientific person for me Gau (cow) is not Maate (mother),” he said, suggesting that cows were important for agrarian families in India and not Hindus in particular.

Acharya said that when he was the pollution control board chairman, he had “searched” lands for 16 scientific slaughter houses across the state and gave permission to six.